Remember When: Cuomo and Silver Edition

Thanks to C-SPAN’s newly available archive, readers have been reliving some of New York’s most memorable moments in politics.

Like Andrew Cuomo’s withdrawal from the 2002 gubernatorial race. In his speech, he said advisers wanted him to go negative, and that the party was still recovering from the contentious 2001 Democratic mayoral election.

Cuomo:

“We wound up behind in the polls and then we had to catch up. And my advisors said to catch up, this is how do it. You run negative TV ads talking about your opponent and what your opponent has done and hasn’t done. And you can use that to lift yourself up. You can go negative, as they say. They believed we could run negative ads and that we could actually make up the difference. That is something I don’t want to and i will not do.”

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“[T]his is also a very special time, and in many ways, a unique time. We still have an open wound that we are dealing with from last year’s Democratic mayoral election. And feelings are still sensitive, and fragile. We need healing now maybe more then ever before, especially in the memory of 9/11.”

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“I will not close a gap in an election by opening one in the body politic.”

And don’t miss this 1989 video, where a young, black-haired Sheldon Silver observes, “I think you’ve seen a national trend, as a result of popular support, to see reductions in taxes.” [He starts talking at the 60-minute mark.]